all right," he said. "I'll sign."

The doctor raised him a trifle, and moistened his lips with brandy as
he gave him the pen. It scratched for a moment or two, and then fell
from his relaxing fingers, while the man who took the paper wrote
across the foot of it, and then would have handed it to Colonel
Barrington, but that Dane quietly laid his hand upon it.

"No," he said. "If you want another witness take me."

Barrington thanked him with a gesture, and Courthorne, looking round,
saw Stimson.

"You have been very patient, Sergeant, and it's rough on you that the
one man you can lay your hands upon is slipping away from you," he
said. "You'll see by my deposition that Winston thought me as dead as
the rest of you did."

Stimson nodded to the magistrate. "I heard what was read, and it is
confirmed by the facts I have picked up," he said.

Then Courthorne turned to Barrington. "I sympathize with you, sir," he
said. "This must be horribly mortifying, but, you see, Winston once
stopped my horse backing over a bridge into a gully when just to hold
his hand would have rid him of me. You will not grudge me the one good
turn I have probably done any man, when I shall assuredly not have the
chance of doing another."

Barrington winced a little, for he recognized the irony in the failing
voice, but he rose and moved towards the bed.

"Lance," he said, a trifle hoarsely, "it is not that which makes what
has happened horrible to me, and I am only glad that you have righted
this man. Your father had many claims on me, and things might have
gone differently if, when you came out to Canada, I had done my duty by
his son."

Courthorne smiled a little, but without bitterness. "It would have
made no difference, sir, and, after all, I led the life that suited me.
By and by you will be grateful to me. I sent you a man who will bring
prosperity to Silverdale."

Then he turned to Stimson, and his voice sank almost beyond hearing as
he said, "Sergeant, remember, Winston fancied I was dead."

He moved his head a trifle, and the doctor stooping over him signed to
the rest, who went out except Barrington.

It was some hours later, and very cold, when Barrington came softly
into the room where Dane lay half-asleep in a big chair. The latter
glanced at him with a question in his eyes, and the Colonel nodded very
gravely.

"Yes," he said. "He has slipped out of the troopers' hands and beyond
our reproaches--but I thi